Cohen's SAC hedge fund to hold investor call on Wednesday

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Steven A. Cohen’s SAC Capital Advisors, facing fresh scrutiny after a former employee was charged with illegal insider trading, plans to hold a conference call on Wednesday, two people familiar with the hedge fund said on Tuesday.

The $14 billion fund, known for delivering decades of strong and steady returns, has worked to calm investors’ nerves over the last week since news broke that a former portfolio manager, Mathew Martoma, allegedly used non-public information to trade in healthcare stocks Elan and Wyeth, now owned by Pfizer Inc.

News of the investor call was earlier reported by Bloomberg News.

The latest arrest raises the number of charged former SAC employees to five, but the hedge fund’s founder, Steven Cohen, has not been accused of any wrongdoing.

But prosecutors have said in court papers that the “owner” of the hedge fund signed off on Martoma’s recommendation to sell the shares of Elan and Wyeth.

A spokesman for SAC Capital said last week that “Mr. Cohen and SAC are confident that they have acted appropriately and will continue to cooperate with the government’s inquiry.”

The Stamford, Connecticut-based firm is not known to hold regular investor calls, and the news has created buzz all over Wall Street. One person on social network Twitter published what he said was the dial-in number to the call, but that number rang through to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.